The present disclosure relates to home cleaning appliances. It finds particular application in conjunction with the cleaning of floors and above-floor surfaces using a cleaning solution.
Portable carpet extractors of the type which apply a cleaning solution to a floor surface and then recover dirty liquid from the surface are widely used for cleaning carpeted and hard surface floors in household settings. Generally, a recovery tank is provided on the extractor for storing the recovered liquid. A vacuum source, such as a vacuum pump, is mounted to a frame of the extractor and applies a vacuum to a nozzle located adjacent the floor surface. For ease of manipulating the extractor, the recovery tank may also be mounted to the base. Carpet extractors of this type are shown, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,325,864; 6,378,162; 6,513,188; 6,533,871; 6,536,071; and 6,721,990, the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entireties.
Commercial, truck mounted carpet extractors often use steam or high temperature liquids to improve cleaning efficiency. In some commercial extractors, cleaning fluid is delivered under pressure from a delivery nozzle. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,974,541, 5,400,462, 6,571,421 and 6,898,820 disclose portable systems for cleaning carpets with heated liquids or steam. Despite improvements in portable extractors, the cleaning efficiency and percent solution recovery of portable extractors generally do not match those achieved with the larger, commercial models. Part of the difference in cleaning can be attributed to the ability of the trained operator to optimize the rate of movement of the cleaning wand of the commercial extractor across the floor surface. It would be desirable to provide an improved carpet extractor, which overcomes some of the difficulties encountered by prior art designs, while providing better and more advantageous results.